First things first: The Pitt Season 2 doesn’t try to outdo the series’ wildly successful first season. Viewers aren’t going to be thrown into the middle of yet another blood-soaked, impossible to navigate, crisis situation that our heroes, nevertheless, manage to navigate with fewer losses than expected. (Or, at least, that doesn’t happen within the nine episodes sent to critics for review ahead the premiere.) Instead, the latest 15-hour shift for Dr. Robby’s staff at PTMC has its own, unique challenges. Naturally, those challenges exist alongside many of the usual, day-to-day ones that you’d expect for a busy ER. It’s the right choice, one that leaves the storytelling grounded and realistic in all the ways that made Season 1 special.
And it’s because of this quiet dedication to honesty, even amidst the bells and whistles that come with trying to make whatever qualifies as “Good Television,” coupled with a cast that’s well and truly the best of the best, that The Pitt Season 2 is at least as good as its predecessor. There are some really lovely callbacks to some of our favorite moments from the series’ freshman season. Many such references are proof that these doctors have paid attention to, and learned from, each other. Some are more overt, like Dr. Langdon showing Mel that a particular lesson he learned from her stuck with him all these months, thus reassuring viewers (and her) that the good in him — all the ways working with Mel, of all people, brought out the best, softest side in him — was real. Langdon, like anyone suffering from the disease, is not “just” his addiction.
Other nods to that day 10 months ago, however, are more about what’s different. Dr. Santos’ bravado starts to crack a bit. It’s still there, but it’s not doing as great of a job of covering for her internal struggles as it once might have. But the things that always mattered to her still do, and it’s in others reminding her not to react a certain way that we remember she once very much did react that way — and caused unnecessary trouble while she was at it. Dr. McKay, on the other hand, brings with her “a lighter vibe,” as Fiona Dourif described it to Give Me My Remote. The absence of all the things that were weighing her down back then makes for a fascinating sort of new, improved (and frustrated in a totally different way) character who, nevertheless, we still see the old version in.
MORE: We said The Pitt Season 1 finale worked because “the people involved with making this series simply…kept doing what had been working all along.” Same goes for Season 2.
Character development between and within the 15-hour shifts
Dana is back and as awesome as ever, but she has a newcomer to guide now. That newcomer, Emma (Laetitia Hollard), gets to see some of the absolute worst of the job but, despite being very green and very, very empathetic, she’s more than capable of doing the work. Actually, the nurses — Princess, Perlah, and Donnie specifically — get more focus in The Pitt Season 2 in general, and the series is better for it.
Student doctor Whitaker is no more — he’s an actual doctor now. The student has become the teacher, which means someone else is having the type of messy first day he once did. And while I’m long past making ER references just for laughs, there’s something about his trajectory and the way he clearly remains close with Robby after that emotional moment in the peds room/makeshift morgue that just screams of a new Carter (without the family money) for a new era. If he happens to earn himself a tiny, proud reaction from Robby when he passes down a hospital tradition, well. That’s just proof that the new title won’t go to this guy’s head. He is, after all, “our Huckleberry.” (Yes, that’s a line you’ll hear this season; and, yes, it manages to be a really sweet one despite the mean nickname Santos gave him.)
Javadi, on the other hand, remains a student — and one who’s convinced she needs to prove herself more than ever, when (at least in our minds) she’s already done that many times over. While she always seemed to be on the outside looking in 10 months ago, though, The Pitt Season 2’s 4th of July shift sees her much more connected, somehow, to everyone who shared that horrible first day with her. So, in a way, you might even be able to say Shabana Azeez’s wish for her character “to make a friend” this season might actually have a shot at coming true. We’re on a path toward progress here, if nothing else.
Like Javadi, Dr. Mohan has grown and matured. There’s something much, much more confident in the way she carries herself. She’s more direct and gets the job done without the constant lectures about how much time it takes. But that doesn’t mean she’s any less dedicated getting it right and making sure healthcare is actually about care. In fact, even in the middle of trying to figure out her future — and some, uh, interesting family developments — she makes time to connect. Sometimes, caring for patients is about listening to what they really need, and Mohan is better at that than ever. Everything we loved about Mohan in Season 1 is still present in The Pitt Season 2. No matter what, she’ll always be “the kind of doctor, as a patient, that you want to meet in the ER,” as Supriya Ganesh put it when we interviewed her last season.
MORE: Check out our interviews with Taylor Dearden and Isa Briones.
What happens in The Pitt Season 2
If you watched the trailer, you’ll know that The Pitt Season 2 sees the hospital going analog. That, much more than the way you’d expect injuries and other party-related emergencies to escalate throughout the day on July 4, is the central crisis of the season. Again, it’s not at all trying to outdo or even redo the first season’s mass casualty event (at least not as of what I’ve seen so far). But it’s totally fascinating, in its own way.
Just as Dr. Robby’s replacement (newcomer Dr. Al-Hashimi, played by Sepideh Moafi) is trying to make our doctors even more technology-dependent, we see just how very, very dangerous of an idea that can be. We’ll get into this concept more with our episodic reviews — or, at least, that’s the plan for now — but let’s just say that there’s a valuable, thought-provoking, open-ended argument here. There are basic skills that, in the near past, would’ve been a requirement for ER doctors to have. With advances in technology, they don’t “need” them anymore. Until they really, really do. So, should we allow AI to “assist” with certain tasks? It could save time…but what do we lose?
For what it’s worth, Al-Hashimi does admit nothing’s perfect, and she is an interesting character in her own right, even outside of that particular contribution to the season arc. Moafi has some great scenes with Noah Wyle — no surprise there because, seriously, who doesn’t? — and her approach to certain doctors on staff is wildly different than his in some areas, quite similar in others. What I’ve seen so far makes me fully invested in seeing how the final six hours of the day play out, what Al-Hashimi can either learn or teach through the experience, and, basically, where everyone winds up.
Long story short, The Pitt Season 2 is another winner, and if you were at all worried about a sophomore slump, don’t be. I also can’t stress how much this series continues do what the best TV must do: make us feel something. The quiet, human moments of this series continue to be some of the absolute best out there. And no, there’s never been another medical drama like it. Not even ER.
The Pitt Season 2 premieres Thursday, January 8 at 9/8c on HBO Max, with new episodes streaming weekly.
